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Being affectionate and supportive to your children could affect their development in the long term says research from the University of Notre Dame in the US.

University of Notre Dame professor of psychology Darcia Narvaez believes that our childhood experiences need to be in line with our evolved needs – the characteristics of parenting used by our distant ancestors but are uncommon today – in order to lead to better developed adults

These characteristics include:

Soothing

Naturalistic perinatal experiences

Responsiveness to a baby’s needs including sensitivity to the signals of the baby before the baby cries

Constant physical presence with plenty of affectionate touch

Extensive breastfeeding

Playful interactions with caregivers and friends, and a community of affectionate, mindful caregivers.

To research her theory Narvaez and colleagues questioned over 600 adults on their childhood experiences, asking how much physical affection they received as children, did they play freely outside and inside the home, did they do things as a family inside and outside the home, and did they feel supported by parents.

The adults who reported receiving more of these parenting practices in their childhood showed less depression and anxiety, more compassion, and a greater ability to look at things from another’s perspective as adults.

However adults who reported less of these parenting practices in their childhood showed poorer mental health, more distress in social situations, and were less able to take another’s point of view.

“Our research shows that when we don’t provide children with what they evolved to need, they turn into adults with decreased social and moral capacities,” says Narvaez. “With toxic stress in childhood, the good stuff doesn’t get a chance to grow and you become stress reactive. It’s hard to be compassionate when you are focused on yourself. We can see adults all around us who were traumatized or undercared for at critical times.”

Narvaez’s previous research also supports the results of this current study.

These previous studies, which included several hundred participants in each sample and included an observational study looking at the parenting practices of parents of three-year-olds, a longitudinal study of a possible link between parenting practices and child development in a national child abuse prevention project, and a comparison study of parenting practices between mothers in the US and China, all supported Narvaez’s theory that parenting practices that were common in foraging hunter-gatherer societies result in improved child development.

The children who experienced more of these parenting approaches showed better mental health, greater empathy, more self-control, and a higher level of intelligence. – AFP Relaxnews